Gilnockie Tower

I (Phoebles) was the first to spot the Gilnockie Tower on account of I was looking out the bridge windows with the big spyglass.

            “Left hand down a bit, the tower is over there,” I says to Ferdy, who is doing the driving.   And he gives me a stern look, as if I’s criticising his navigation or summat.   I do have very keen eyesight, ’specially when I got the spyglass.   But Ferdy’s being OK too.  

            Polly sticks her head round the door.

            “Are we nearly there yet?”

            So I says, “Yup, we’ll be landing within the hour.”

            And she says, “In that case I am going to bugger off in my little red plane.   If things don’t go to plan you all may need back up later.”

            She’s dead good in that thing.   It’s a Polikarpov I-16 fighter, red all over with yellow stars and two 7.62mm ShKAS machine guns and two 20mm ShVAK cannons mounted in the wings.   And it’s dead manouverable.  She stopped off at the officers’ canteen to pick up a pre-ordered packet of Catapano goats cheese and Coln Valley smoked salmon sandwiches and to refill her hip flask with cheap vodka.

            “No point using the good stuff,” she said, “in the middle of a dog fight I spill more than I drink.”

            “You should get one of those Beerbelly™ WineRack bra’s for hands free drinking,” suggested the Pusser.

            “What’s a bra?” asked Polly.

            The best things about the Airship of State are deffo the food.   She has chefs instead of cooks and three-Michelin-star gourmet restaurants instead of mess decks and there is all day breakfasts available ALL DAY!

            Anyway, back to the story.   Polly gets in her plane and starts up the engine and stuff, while the crew are unbolting thing and hammering and swearing at the release mechanism.   Then there is a clunk and the red Rata drops away from beneath the airship.   And she is whizzing off towards the horizon doing barrel rolls as she goes.

            And I has another look through the spyglass.   It’s dead good, made of brass tubes that slide inside each other and when you stretch them out it’s really long and makes things look ever so close even when they’re not.   I’m looking at Gilnockie Tower again.   It is dour, built of grey stone and has a little flag on top.   We approach slowly from down wind and come in over the croquet lawn.   Lots of ghillies (sort of Scotch servants) in greeny-bluey tartan kilts and matching bonnets rush out to catch our mooring lines as we cast them down, and we are dragged and guided over towards the stables, where we are tethered close to the laird’s Silver Ghost.

            Once we have all tumbled out onto the gravel drive a window in the tower opens and someone shouts, “Come on in and get yourselves out of the cold,” ‘cos it is quite nippy out.   There’s a flight of narrow stone stairs on the outside of the tower, up to a small doorway on the first floor and the door is really heavy, three layers thick of oak planking laid at right angles to each other, which is called axe proof, and lots of iron strapping.   Inside, the reception hall is stark stonework, but we are met by a homely little woman in an apron and ushered into what she describes as the library.   The walls are lined with bookshelves and the shelves filled with books.   There is a tiny window, a huge inglenook containing a miserably weedy fire and a few stubs of candles scattered about for lighting.   Drawn up close to the fireplace is a large leather wing-backed armchair.

            “Come and warm yourselves by the fire,” says the chair.   Only it’s not the chair talking.   A tabby, greying-whiskered face appears round the side and a short, rather portly cat rises to great us.   He wears a maroon fez on his head, a crushed-velvet smoking jacket, a dress kilt of the same green and light blue, with a little bit of red, tartan as we saw on the ghillies, bed socks and carpet slippers.   His green eyes survey us through wire-rimmed spectacles.

            “I am the Gilnockie of Gilnockie,” and he shakes all our hands, and Ferdinand’s wing stub, vigorously.   We grab what seating we can and draw up to the fire.   Boz and Slasher have wobbly stools, Ferdy, Barrymore and Ginsbergbear are cosied up on a wooden bench and I found a beanbag that looked really comfy, but it has just swallowed me and I don’t feel very dignified.

            “Catriona will be in shortly with porridge and mugs of malt whisky.   No point wasting time, while we wait we can start the negotiations.”

             Slasher was the first to speak.   “Has there been any follow up to our chat last time I was up this way?”

            “Ah well…   There have been meetings.   The Moss Troopers are Felis Silvestris Grampia, like myself, and will follow their own inclinations regardless of what I suggest.   But for the most part the Border Reivers are fed up to the back teeth with your aggressive policing.   It is getting in the way of commerce and legitimate cattle thieving.   They are willing to sign up to a truce while they see how it pans out.   I have also been in touch with the pirate king.   Do you know him, Captain Rotskagg Blenkinsopp?   He doesn’t have quite the authority his title suggests, but the Corsairs can’t move in the North Sea at the moment without one of your airships turning up, so they’re willing to talk.”

            There is a commotion at the door and the lady in the apron, who it turns out, is Catriona, wheezes into the library pushing a rattly old catering trolley.   It’s got steaming bowls of thick, dishwater-grey porridge, a huge bottle of Bunnahabhain single malt whisky and a blowtorch.   She pours the whisky over the porridge and then flambés it with the torch.   There is a scary whump of flame and some of the nearby books catch light.   She calmly throws the burning tomes to the floor and stamps them out.  

            “There’ll be haggis for tea, if the Gillies have managed to bag one, with champit tatties and bashed neeps.”

            “Thank you, Catriona, we can barely wait.”

            Then we all tuck in to our porridge, which is REALLY salty, not like at home, and I’m not liking it much, but you got to be polite.   Conversation is replaced by munching for a while and then Boz pipes up:

            “I’ve got an idea.   It’s the Tamworth Ranters’ Gala coming up soon, and that’s always good for a laugh.   Lets all meet there and after the fun we can have a conference.   If you sir…” he addresses The Gilnockie, “ …bring some of your chaps and this pirate king along, we’ll get Larry to join us and we can thrash out a deal.”

            “Sounds good to me,” says The Gilnockie of Gilnockie, “Will there be booze?”

            “Good Burton ale,” says Ginsbergbear, puffing quietly on his Peterson briar.

            “But no weapons,” chips in Barrymore, “and that includes bagpipes.”

            “What about Les Chats Souterrains?” asks Ferdy, “No one’s mentioned them yet.”

            “Ah…”

That’s when I become aware of a whirry buzzing noise from outside.

            “Last time I heard a sound like that we were running for our lives in Castleton,” says I.

            “Oh no,” groans Boz.   And we all rush up onto the battlements in time to see the metallic Frisbee glinting pink and mauve in the setting sunlight.

            “Is that a real flying saucer?” shouts The Gilnockie.

            “Les Chats Souterrains’ foo-fighter,” says Ferdy, “We really don’t need this right now.”

            It’s got revolving, flashing lights and flies straight over the croquet lawn level with the battlements, and it is so close we can see the pilot’s face, all white and demented in dark goggles.   The flying saucer whizzes right past us, cranks its death ray round and targets The Airship of State.   And it doesn’t do the dirigible any good at all.   There are a series of explosions and a sort of crumpling metal greeouch noise and our airship transport collapses in on itself in flames.

            “Bugger.” Says Slasher McGoogs, looking pointedly at Boz, “Someone’s going to get that stopped out of his pocket money.”

            “If they’ve scorched my Roller,” screams The Gilnockie, “I’m going to get really cross.”

            The foo fighter is just beginning to train its death ray onto the upper floors of Gilnockie Tower when a stream of bullets is pinging off it’s hull.   Out of the majestic, orange disc of the sun races a little crimson Rata, and it will be opening up with its cannons any moment.   The saucer recoils and then hurtles off towards the east at an incredible speed, enthusiastically pursued by Polly, shooting as she goes.   But there’s more…

            “Hens’ teeth!” exclaims Slasher McGoogs as he peers over the parapet and his Mauser Red9 materialises in his right paw.   A wraithlike army is pouring out of the deciduous woods that border the castle grounds.   White cats in brass goggles are forming up to surround the tower, their white leather greatcoats conspicuous in the flickering firelight of our ravished airship.   They are carrying scaling ladders and grappling hooks, and as the sun goes down Les Chats Souterrains are pushing their dark goggles up onto their pickelhaubs or down to hang round their neck.   There are Moss Troopers in the ranks as well, large, fierce tabbies in dented tin-hats, a motley assortment of mismatched armour, basket hilted broadswords and targes.   And there are a few mercenaries from the continental wars too, distinguishable by their flamboyant wide brimmed hats with ostrich feathers, slashed jackets and vicious Tua handit swerdis.   (That’s what the locals call them.)

            “That’s the overmighty Black Douglas down there,” growls The Gilnockie, “treacherous dog.”   Black Douglas glances up and they wave to each other.   I can make out the uniforms of Le Régiment Étranger over by the ornamental carp pond where cats are checking the magazines on their PPSh-41 Machineguns.   A sea of frowning white faces with beady pink eyes stare up at us.

            The Gilnockie’s ghillie-weetfit rushes onto the battlements with his master’s brace of Purdy shot guns.   “We’ve shuttered the windows and barricaded the door.   Have you seen that mob down below, sir?   They don’t look very friendly.”   Several ghillies appear with arms full of pikes, halberds and scimitars that had, until minutes ago, decorated the walls of the dining hall, and others have brought the contents of the gun cupboard.   Catriona is the last up with a bundle of tweed country jackets to keep out the chill.

            I am just starting to feel a bit better about our chances when another bunch of ruffians emerge to form up behind Les Chats.   These are huge ginger haired highlanders in kilts and Borderers in scraps of ancient, ill-fitting armour, cuirasses and plackarts, mail, greaves and vambraces.   For the most part they carry old Sten Guns and assault rifles, Czech Sa vz 58Ps, Enfield Bullpups, Sturmgewehr 44s, Cristobal carbines and stuff I can only guess at; trophies from countless raids and conflicts, passed down from father to son.

            “Those were my boys,” says The Gilnockie, “Looks like they’ve sided with the opposition.   Sorry.   We could be out on a bit of a limb, here.”

            But the newcomers aren’t exactly mingling or being welcomed.   Les Chats are starting to look uncomfortable and mumbling amongst themselves.   And now the cavalry has arrived, in olive green fatigues and balaclavas, hefting AK-47s.   I can see a tall white horse ridden by a slim chap in a flamboyant hussar uniform with his face hidden behind a ski mask under his shiny black shako.

            That’s, Subcomandante Everyman,” I shout.   And Boz looks quizzically at Slasher McGoogs:

            “I thought you were Subcommandante Everyman.”

            “Not this time old chap,” he replies.   Because it is the Snake Pass Zapatistas and there is their black banner with a scull and crossbones, and Snowdrop canters out of the woods on her tachanka with Strawberry manning the Maxim Model 1910.

             Les Chats Soutarrains have split into small groups, with their hands in their pockets, staring at their feet or whistling innocently.   The scaling ladders have been abandoned on the lawn and are being avoided by their erstwhile owners.   The white menace is melting away with the cats of Le Régiment Étranger covering their retreat whilst trying hard to look as if they are not, and the Zapatistas strike up a merry La Cucaracha to encourage the departure.

We are all rushing down stairs and wrenching away the heavy timbers that brace the outside door and are dashing out to meet the Zapatistas.   Les Chats Souterrains are all gone, Black Douglass and his Moss Troopers have disappeared and the mercenaries are trying to negotiate a change of paymaster, without much success.   Subcomandate Everyman springs down from his charger.   He strides over towards us, removing his shako and ski mask.   And it is Aunty Stella!

Phoebles

Somewhere north of The Wall

Andromeda Geräte

 “All crew to their stations.   Prepare to surface.”   The distorted voice of Otto von Luckner crackled over the ship’s Tannoy system.

“Kapitän Entwhistle, if you would like to join me at the periscope.”

            Minutes later Harold appeared on the Command Deck accompanied by his Chief Engineer, Albert Fleck, short and skeletal in a boiler suit that had once been white, hob-nail boots, a dish-rag round his neck and a woollen tea-cosy on his head.

            “Ah Kapitän, and you have brought your stoker.   Would you like to take a look at our destination?”   Von Luckner ushered the trawlermen to the periscope and Harold peered into the eyepiece.   He could see ice and snow – pretty much like all the ice and snow they had been surrounded by since coming south.   Dead ahead was a low black rectangle sheltered beneath an overhang in the cliff.

            “Can I see too?” asked Albert.   As he surveyed the desolate scene a lonely wandering albatross waddled over to the funny stick protruding through a hole in the lightly frozen ocean and blocked out the view.   Distorted goggle eyes peered in at the startled artificer.

            “What the f… …is that?

            “The entrance to our U-Boat pens,” the Kapitänleutnant turned to his ensign, “Take her up.”

            “Bow planes ten degrees, rudder amidships, blow all tanks.”

            The Seeadler surfaced, breaking through the thin layer of barely formed ice and startling the inquisitive seabird into panicked flight.

            A queue of ship’s officers formed at the bottom of the conning tower ladder whilst the Oberfähnrich climbed up to open the hatch.   Von Luckner took two paces back and, with a hand pressed against Harold’s chest, indicated that the trawlermen should do the same.   Seawater showered through the hatchway onto the up-turned faces below.

            “This happens every time.   They never learn.”

The submersible’s deck officers were clustered outside on top of the conning tower when Harold and Albert joined them and the Seeadler was gliding silently towards the cavernous entrance.   As they entered the submarine pens the crew lined the deck to take a salute from stevedores gathered on the nearest floating quay; a small brass band with a glockenspiel played ‘Edelweiss’.   While Seeadler navigated alongside and was made fast Bert Fleck observed a Cuban, Foxtrot Class submarine and a Type VIIC/41 Flak U-Boat on neighbouring pontoons.   The sleek Cuban vessel appeared to be making ready to sail.

            “Stop engines.   Prepare to disembark.”   Once the trawlermen had been rounded up Easter joined Harry and Albert with von Luckner, Billy Tate remained with the crew who were quickly escorted ashore.

            “Your men will be treated well, Kapitän.   You may check on their wellbeing in a little while.   But I wish to be with you when you first set eyes on our establishment here.”   The Kapitänleutnant indicated the gangway.   They proceeded along the pontoon to a short ramp and then ascended a long escalator.   Globe lamps on patinated bronze mounts lit their way, the architecture was modernist with a severely Teutonic twist.

            They emerged into a spacious concourse.   Half-moon skylights, pierced through the sea-green ceiling high above, cast shafts of daylight into the scene below, the polished Carrera floor shone like water, the walls glowed with warm beige marble cladding.   A mahogany cased clock dominated the far end of the hall and dwarfed figures scurried purposefully wherever the Yorkshiremen looked.   Just ahead a sulky line of king penguins shuffled past, heads down and shoulders hunched.   Intermittently each in turn would squawk a mumbled complaint.   Nearby stood a group of self absorbed men in tall orange hats, with faces of wrinkled, walnut leather; their saffron robes all but hidden by too large, wrap around yak-skin coats, secured at the waist by string.

            “Lizard men?” enquired Harold Entwhistle of his host.

            “None of us will ever meet the Merovingian Lizard Kings, my friend.   That is not their way.   These men of the Himalayas are envoys.

“Let me show you to your quarters, and on the way I will point out the officers’ mess.   I will meet you back there in…   Shall we say one hour?”

The officers’ mess was done out with a great deal of chrome and had the feel of an outsized American diner.   Harold, Easter and Albert were sat at a cramped Formica table and had given a food order to a well-rounded fraulein in a short blue gingham dress and dinky, matching forage cap by the time they were joined by Kapitänleutnant Otto Graf von Luckner.   Albert removed his tea cosy, stuffed it in a pocket and ran his fingers through his greasy hair.   The waitress appeared with three All Day Breakfasts.

            “Good, you have ordered.   I will have an Americano, two shots of expresso, not too much water… and a small piece of your excellent schwarzwälder kirschtorte, if I may, my dear.”

            Easter scowled at his surroundings, “All seems very clean - for a secret Nazi UFO base.   Where’s the Storm Troopers.”

            Otto sighed, “To business then.   First I must explain to you our situation, we will postpone the small talk, pleasant as that would be, till later.  

“There were never many Nazis here; our original expedition was, after all, a scientific survey.   Those first comers were not intending to become colonists.   There were not many women on the original expedition either but somehow, three generations later, we are still here.   Our ancestors established a small base on this spot, claimed the land for the Greater Germany, began surveying the area and then made a discovery that changed everything.   You had better come with me and I will show you…   The secret you have come to uncover…   The reason you can never leave.”  

            “Never…   What?”   Albert shot to his feet, banging his knees on the table, which was, fortunately, securely bolted to the floor.

            Easter joined in with, “Now look here, captain...”

            “Please.   Just come with me.   We can discuss your future circumstances later.”

The Yorkshire trio were still protesting vehemently as they crossed the concourse to one of a number of departure gates.   Four of the mysterious, saffron clad orientals formed up silently behind them.   A discoloured sign in a Gebrochene Schrift black letter typeface indicated AG Gate23 and below it an attendant, inspecting von Luckner’s pass, nodded them through.   They entered a tube-like chamber lined with benches and settled down together whilst the mute envoys sat nearby, yet pointedly apart from the sailors.   The doors slid shut with a whoosh, there was a sharp Plop, a hiss and a sensation of rapid acceleration.

            “We are travelling in a pneumatic tube subway.   First proposed, I believe, by your excellent Herr Brunel, though it has taken German vorsprung durch technik to make it work.”

            “Not Isambard, for once, George Medhurst, a Kentishman,” muttered Bert Fleck, “but I bet he half inched the idea off a Yorkshireman.”

            The travelers were contemplating the engineer’s observation as their transport stopped with an uncomfortable suddenness and the doors slid open.   Otto stood back to let the Himalayan envoy disembark first, then he and the trawlermen followed along a gently sloping ice tunnel.   At its end the oldest and shortest emissary, with the tallest hat, approached a small glowing tablet, placed his right palm upon it and a door swung open.   The four monk-like beings entered first, followed reluctantly by Easter and Albert Fleck.   Harold and the Kapitänleutnant brought up the rear.   They found themselves inside a bare reception area.   The curved outer walls were comprised of an alloy that Harold could not identify.   There was no corrosion or decay, though there were signs of wear and an impression of great age.   The inner bulkheads and floors were transparent and, disconcertingly, they could see down through several floors beneath their feet.   In the room below were parked two foo fighters under plastic sheeting.     

            “Schoonfryder,” whispered von Luckner, “but there are many different types of what you would call UFO in neighbouring bays.”

            “Great,” said Albert, who was pressed against the only wall that looked solid and was very deliberately not looking down.

            The diminutive monk turned to address the company, “Discovering this the great grandfather of young Otto was.   Lying here undisturbed for many millennia it had been.   Under the ice.   A secret it was, and must remain.   The Andromeda Machine.   Within a UFO mother ship you are.”

Flight

Suddenly the vast space was echoing to Klaxon alarms, the walls flashing in reflected crimson light.  

“Up There!” someone had shouted above the general row and, with the first bullets ripping and pinging about them, the boys abandoned their rucksacks and scurried after Ginsbergbear as he disappeared back down the ventilation duct.   They were scuttling awkwardly in the confined space, but the bumping and scraping behind them told of their pursuit by Chats Souterrains far more comfortable in the claustrophobic darkness.   After an eternity of blind shoving, shouting, scrabbling they fell, sweating and wheezing, into the main tunnel and continued their mad dash without any attempt at concealment.   As they ran there were distant shouts and explosions behind them.   Then they became aware of a throbbing whine rapidly growing in volume.

“Take cover!” shouted Boz, and they pressed against the dark walls as the saucer, the craft they had seen on its railway truck, whooshed past.   It veered towards the tunnel wall and directed a static discharge, ionising the air ahead, the electromagnetic crackling mingling with a booming sound beam howl, like an amateur brass band attempting a Charles Ives composition.   The wall dissolved into tatters akin to a moth eaten lace curtain and the gaping maw of the Devil’s Arse appeared ahead.    Boz and Slasher broke cover, the others following close on their heels, and rushed through the shimmering gap before the rock wall could reform and the overlapping universes part company once more.   The saucer, silhouetted against the sky, zoomed out and up, scattering jackdaws, its mission unknown and its crew’s attention far from the fleeing group that followed in its wake.   Slasher broke his step momentarily to fire his Mauser, once, into the blackness behind them.   The shot echoed around the cavern like a fusillade; the others flinched, but the relentless pounding of their commando-booted pursuers did not faulter.   They fled past the ropewalk and workers hovels out into the winding back alleys of Castleton – ducking, weaving, bouncing off walls in their wild flight.

Flight of the Sore Afraid

                                    Out of the Devil’s Arse we blundered

                                    Into the street where Emos chundered

                                    Scattering Goths

                                    And Punks who wondered

                                    “What the f..?”

                                    We did not make reply

                                    Theirs was not to wonder why

                                    Theirs was but to duck or die

                                    Les Chats’ Sten guns thundered

                                    Bullets to the left of us

                                    Bullets to the right of us

                                    Bullets from behind us

                                    Buzzed and whined

                                    Blasted with shot and shell

                                    Swiftly we ran… ah well

                                    Out of that mouth of Hell

                                    Nought could our terror quell

                                    I wish we could catch a bus

                                    We must be mad as bats

                                    Taking on the pallid Chats

                                    Rounds ripping through our hats

                                    Gasping teddy wheezing cats

                                    Tottering Dodo

                                    Legs all spent

                                    Relentlessly pursued by Paras

                                    Tough old vets of Mons and Arras

                                    Battle hardened bold as brass

                                    Armed to the teeth they’ll kick our ass

                                    Our future looks like diddly squats

                                    A miracle’s our only chance

                                    A cavalry with sword and lance

                                    On mighty steeds that rear and prance

                                    Slasher chucks t’ward me a glance

                                    “Is that Plan B?”

                                    “There’s no Plan B”

                                    Grovelling upon all fours

                                    Hammering on shuttered doors

                                    Mourning for our last lost cause

                                    Doomed Amigos of El Boz

                                    Is this really our last dance?

Ginsbergbear,

Convalescing

- A four pipe recovery.

Into the Bowels of the Earth They Venture.

With Boz in the lead and Slasher McGoogs bringing up the rear the adventurers wriggled and crawled down the narrow flu.   Slasher checked regularly over his shoulder for any sign that they were followed and surreptitiously fingered his Mauser Red Nine, his security blanket; the rest of them would be furious if they knew he was toting a real and loaded weapon.   The atmosphere was oppressive and damp, the hum grew louder as they descended and there was a definite breeze coming up from below.   Soon the tunnel widened slightly and Bozzy stopped.

“There is a large extractor fan fixed into the tunnel, blocking our way.   Can I have that Swiss Army Knife of yours, please Ferdy?”

Using the Philips screwdriver attachment, Boz removed a small service cover and with the insulated wire cutting attachment snipped a brown insulated wire.   The fan stopped.   The sudden silence was not comforting.   He next undid the wire safety cage with the flat bladed screwdriver attachment and then used the adjustable spanner attachment to unscrew a large nut on the hub.   With the fan taken out and a large hole snipped out of the far safety cover, using the heavy-duty wire cutter attachment, the gang were able to squeeze through.   Phoebles got a bit stuck due to an excessively generous breakfast, but a firm push from behind by Ferdy soon freed him.   Slasher was the last cat through.

“We’d best press on.   Someone might come to investigate why the fan’s not working,” he whispered.

The tunnel was still descending steeply, but from that point on it had been chiselled out to a reasonable diameter and it was paved.   Moving quickly downwards they eventually came to an almost vertical shaft with iron rungs set into the wall.   At the bottom they were in a sizeable cave chamber, part of the Peak Cavern system.   There were stalactites hanging down and dripping, and rounder orange or yellow topped stalagmites reaching up.   Occasionally mite met tite to form a thin column of gothic tracery.   From oozing cracks in the wall green fingers of limestone deposit had dribbled over millennia, forming grotesque gargoyle guardians to terrorise the feint of heart.   A narrow path wove through the natural hypostyle, between petrified forests of sculpted rock, a fast-running stream carved deep into the cave floor.   They were in the dark - a creeping, all encompassing darkness that seeped into the soul; a darkness broken only by the narrow beams of their headlamps which cast menacing shadows about the interior, shadows of hideous beings that could only exist in such blackness.   Not helping their disquiet, the silence was total and they were entirely alone.   The Peak Cavern had been closed to visitors since inexplicable, phantom, will o’ the wisp lights and unnatural humming sounds had terrified the tourists.   Not that weirdness was unknown within the cave system.   Toilet odours bubbling up from the bowels and moans and farts amplified and echoing about the antediluvian orifice had led the pious, medieval serfs of Castleton to christen this The Devil’s Arse – a name which stuck until a visit by the Queen Empress had required a less graphic appellation.   The improved address was more than welcomed by the cord winders who lived and worked within the vast cave mouth.

Approaching the back of the chamber the gang found that the stream issued from a low culvert.   The pathway had originally terminated at a small quay alongside which lay coffin-like barges in which recumbent adventurers were, in times gone by, pulled one at a time under the rocky vault and into the chamber beyond.   Luckily, nineteenth century etiquette could not allow such demeaning transport for a visiting monarch and a relief tunnel had been dynamited through to the next stage of the tour.   It is a low passage, for Queen Victoria was short.

The second chamber was even larger than the first, fewer stalactites, but the path mounted the rock wall to clamber over a tumbling mass of hardened mineral sediment that cascaded down to the stream in terraces filled with crescent moons of still, black water.    Twenty yards further and the path veered to cross, high above the stream on an iron footbridge supported on slim, fluted, floriform columns.   In a side gallery they could make out a derelict narrow gauge railway track to nowhere and a derailed, rusted and battered wagon.   Beyond this their path descended through a straight, well-constructed tunnel with a brick floor, rust-red plumbing ran along the foot of the passage wall, old iron pipes, repainted many times, new aluminium pipes silver-gleaming in the light of the headlamps.   The companions could hear rushing water ahead and at the bottom of the decline the track ended with a handrail, they were overlooking a wide, fast running underground river; the tourist trail ended here.   However, the pipes turned to disappear into holes drilled through the rock wall and next to them was an old, weathered wooden door, blue-grey paint flaking, something indecipherable and worn stencilled in no-longer white letters.   There was a latch, but no lock.

The little group of nervous adventurers entered what was apparently a service tunnel.   The pipes, now running along wall and ceiling, were joined by many others.   Thick and thin, new and old, the pipes congregated, merged and parted, danced around each other.   There were valves and junctions, U-bends and Z-bends, a labyrinthine tangle dreamed up by a plumber spaced out on something stronger than catnip.   Heavy-duty cables sheathed in lead festooned the walls, fed steel boxes that buzzed and tiny coloured lamps that flickered.   A socket, corroded by the damp, beside one such box, was joined by an outdated, frayed a twisted flex to a faintly glowing glass orb which seemed to hang in the air by its own will power.   A large riveted iron tank, with a brass tap that dripped, almost filled the chamber.   Our intrepid gang had to remove their rucksacks in order to squeeze past.   The tunnel was not straight – it snaked inexplicably; plant life thrived on the dank walls and the odours of rot and decay hung around every unscrubbed nook and neglected cranny.

“Great God!   This is an awful place…” quoted Ginsbergbear.

“We are very near the end, but have not and will not lose our good cheer,” responded Ferdy.

“I think the end may be in sight,” chipped in Boz.

 The large hatch that faced them was battleship grey.   It had a porthole, which was painted over.   It had steel clamps at the corners, which Boz undid.   It had a maroon wheel handle, which Boz turned.   The heavy door swung back and Boz found himself teetering above an impenetrably gloomy void.   Ahead was a polished, lightly greased, bronze pole.   Without thinking too hard he wrapped his arms tightly around it and jumped.

“Shi…!”

And the others followed.

“Geronimo!”

“Mother!”

“Timothy Leary!”

As the pile of bodies at the base of the pole grew, they heard the steady clunk clunk clunk of hobnailed hiking boots on iron rungs.   The voice from above belonged to Slasher McGoogs.

“Perhaps another time you may wish to give some consideration to your actions before leaping… and maybe have a look around for a less thrilling alternative.”   He completed his descent of the cast-iron spiral staircase and began to help the boys pick themselves up and dust themselves off.   Ferdy had friction burns on some of his wing-stub feathers, Phoebles had grazed his knee, Ginsbergbear had snapped his favourite pencil and they had all landed on top of Boz.   There were no other injuries.   Once composed they began to look around.   They had arrived in one of the main linking shafts of Les Chats Souterrains – wide, arched and concrete lined.   It carried a tarmacadam roadway and twin narrow gauge railway tracks.   The artery and its subsidiary systems existed parallel to or even confluent with the cave system, just a tiny dimensional twist away, kept apart by a micron thin membrane of warped space-time.   It was but a miniscule section of the Atlantian world-wide tunnel system, disused for eons and now usurped by the Lizard Kings, which honeycombs the earth’s crust, linking natural cave systems, accessible only under mystic circumstances from every mine, cavern, metro and catacomb; normally undetectable and gateway, some maintain, to the inner world of our hollow earth.

“Wow!” exclaimed Phoebles.

“Just come on!” insisted McGoogs.   But they had not gone far when they heard the purr of a combustion engine.   Scrambling quickly as they could up a fall of rock and scree the boys gained a wide ledge, well above eye height, and cautiously peeped down.   What they saw was the arrival of a dazzle-camouflage painted Mini Moke Twinny, which halted whilst four characters, uniformly dressed in light-grey one-piece overalls, got out.   They had pallid, narrow faces, tiny pink eyes and overly large ears.   They were armed and they were searching.

“I’ve never seen them without their goggles before,” said Phoebles, “Ugly looking bunch.”

“I don’t think we should hang around here,” said Slasher, wrenching a grill off the wall behind them.   “Boz, you come through last, and pull this grating back in place.”

They were in a small, square cross-sectioned shaft that carried a steady draft of warm air.   It inclined gently and branched off at regular intervals.   At length their somewhat randomly chosen route emerged into a gallery that overlooked a truly vast cavern.   Ginsbergbear threw himself back from the edge and pressed into the cave wall.   Ferdy and Phoebles gave out simultaneous gasps.   This was Titan, the belly of Behemoth – one hundred foot of vault above them and an eighty-foot drop to the floor below.   They were looking down into the mother of all chambers - and it swarmed with industry.

Mass tangles of wiring hung between flickering screens and bays of valves, beam tetrodes glowing violet or lime-green.   Rainbow lights pulsed along ionized gasses in glass tubes and flasks.   Heavy-duty High Tension cables hung from ceramic insulators and harsh strip lighting dangled precariously from chains and improvised scaffolding.   High on one wall a huge screen showed:

Project Deadline

[] [] / [] [] / [] [] [] [] 

Don’t let the Mayans down

“We can’t use the water pistols with all this electricity about –remove your magazines and pass them to Ferdy,” ordered Boz.  

They could make out several assembly lines trundling inwards towards the centre of the floor.   One carried copper tanks like oversize water heaters.   Another line was doing pipe cots, with robot arms sewing canvas covers and welding joints.   Yet another bore printed circuit boards, technical bits and electronic pieces, between robots that soldered and snipped, towards half-finished, splayed-bell shaped craft, like bizarre giant hub caps, their shell plates being welded, riveted and spray-painted by beavering robots on the outside, whilst metal mechanics rushed in and out with the fittings as they arrived on the lines.   One completed craft, developed from a German, Nationalsozialismus prototype design of the 1940s sat on a flatbed railway truck receiving the finishing touches to its paint job.   A Chat Souterrain in a silver radiation suit and fish-bowl helmet was stencilling alien symbols around the hull:

 µƒß  ç¬ø∂^øñ  +       

 “Looks a bit like Sanskrit to me,” said Phoebles, to everyone else’s surprise.

The pals grouped and squatted in a circle to discuss a plan of action while an apparently uninterested Ginsbergbear opened a nearby junction box that had caught his attention, marked as it was with the inscription ‘DON’T!’ on the door in large, red letters.   Once inside he snipped through some of the wiring, mostly blue wires, and a fat bunch of filaments that had all been taped together.   He unscrewed a connector block and began swapping connections, yellow wires for green wires, brown wires for the pretty little striped ones.   Finally he took two red wires and shorted them together with a crack and a spark.    Down below some of the banks of valves flickered and went out.   Some of the valves began to glow brighter and brighter.   Then they all began to strobe neurotically.   The robots lost control, mechanical arms waved and jerked, welding arms lanced and riveting arms sewed.   The humming and crackling of barely harnessed alternating current soared orgasmically.   White coated overseer Chats looked uncertain, worried, panicked.   Bolts of lightening began to arc over the insulators and a maniacally frenzied laser arm sliced a ruby pencil of lethal light through a dangling power cable.   The severed conduit swung down till its exposed core shorted against one of the bays, sprayed sparks above the growing pandemonium.

“RUN!”  cried Ginsbergbear as he rushed past his comrades, and a small explosion shook the stalactites.